Seize the Night by Sherrilyn Kenyon
Genre: Paranormal-Romance, Adult
Series: Dark-Hunters #7
Published: Published February 24th 2005 by Piatkus Books
Valerius isn’t a popular Dark-Hunter-he’s a Roman, which means that the largely Greek Hunters have a major grudge against him and his civilization for superceding them. To make things worse, he’s very conscious of his aristocratic background and breeding. So it serves him right when he runs into Tabitha Devereaux. She’s sassy, sexy, and completely unwilling to take him seriously. (Not to mention that she’s the twin sister of the wife of former Dark-Hunter Kyrian-Val’s mortal enemy.) What Tabitha does take seriously is hunting and killing vampires-and soon she and Val have to grapple with the deadliest of all Daimons-one who’s managed to come back from the dead, and one who holds a serious grudge against both of them. To win against evil, Val will have to loosen up, learn to trust, and put everything on the line to protect a man he hates and a woman who drives him nuts.
My Review:
Dark, enticing and exciting, everything about this book made me hunger for it more. Valerius was a sexy, sensuous man who was struggling with being estranged from society, which wasn’t entirely his fault and Tabitha is every bit of kick-ass and sensitive to what a female protagonist needs to be. The two were unconventional, they had problems, they were entire opposites and they had the gulf of family hatred, but this made it all the more thrilling, and exciting to witness forbidden romance and Kenyon really engaged me with the seventh instalment of the Dark-Hunter series. I think these get better as they go along!
“Perhaps, but it wouldn’t bother him so much if he was the one who bored the brunt of it. The disaster always seemed to fall onto the ones he tried to help.”
Valerius is a character I haven’t liked all that much up until this point. However, I think this is the perception from other characters who don’t like Valerius and in ‘Seize the Night’ we really get the opportunity to see Valerius flourish as a character and develop his own identity. I feel like in the other novels he’s been forced to conform to other’s expectations and here was our chance to see Valerius free and wild. He’s certainly a man who’s pompous, an ass and a little snobbish, but beneath the surface is a nice guy who needs to be comforted and accepted.
The Dark-Hunter series has lots of elements that get drawn into making a complex, exciting and thrilling read. We link back to the previous novels where Tabitha’s sister ends up in trouble and the ideas continue to develop and become ever the more intricate. There was lots of elements from demons, ghosts and God powers that intervened in the everyday life of Tabitha who is one of my favourite female characters. She ploughs headlong into everything and engages with all the fights, takes not crap from anybody, but beneath it all like Valerius she’s a little jagged on the inside and needs somebody there for her. She made a Batman reference and boom, I loved her.
“Good evening, my lord.” His butler didn’t comment on the fact that Valerius was coming home wet. There was something about the rigid, older Englishman that reminded Tabitha of Alfred from Batman.”
The romance was crafted well and I think Kenyon has become a bit of an expert about this by now. She doesn’t throw the two together, but generally they fight and struggle before settling into a equilibrium that works whilst we get some intense, steamy moments there always seem to be a moment for humour and light-heartedness.
Kenyon really keeps up the standards with this one and all I can say is she had a real stunner of an ending. I’m excited to get hold of the next novel and immerse myself in the adventures and twists and turns of the next Dark-Hunter book because Kenyon never seems to bring two things the same with every new plot twist. Although, I swear if she makes one more character immortal, there will be nobody left who can die!
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